Are These the Country's Best Donuts?

Chicago's donut newcomer Firecakes might be making the very best in the country.

Chicago has long been one of America’s best donut cities. And as our own David Tamarkin reported recently, quite a few newcomers have joined the fray, updating the classics and introducing the city to whole new array donut delights (see Glazed & Infused’s “bar snack” variety, covered in pretzels and M&Ms).

After a systematic sampling of the city’s favorites, old and new, I’m here to say that David missed the best of them all in his post: Firecakes, in River North, which opened earlier this year. Behind its cute windowed storefront you’ll find a dozen or so picture-perfect donuts arranged unassumingly—as if they were not the most delicious things in the world—on simple aluminum trays atop a marble countertop.

The chocolate hazelnut long john is a soft, chewy log slathered with glossy ganache and a dusting of powdered nuts. The coconut cream is a beautiful round of cake dusted with coconut flakes, filled in the center with cream and topped with flower petals. The old fashioned buttermilk is deceptively simple, a moist, dense cake, with just the right kind of crusty edges.

But the one that really sent me over the moon was the butterscotch praline—an airy pillow of a raised donut generously stuffed with rich butterscotch cream and topped with a buttery caramel glaze and powdered nuts (pictured right). There’s no seating at Firecakes, so I experienced my donut nirvana, rather improbably, on a street bench a few feet away, perched next to the remnants of a McDonald’s value meal someone left there the night before. No matter. That donut was outrageous.

It may be the praline talking, but I’m gonna say Firecakes isn’t just Chicago’s best. It’s the country’s best. Discuss.